


Uber

by minkisolostan



Category: NU'EST
Genre: But Noah is, Extremly light angst, I'm a terrible person Minhyun is not in this, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-08
Updated: 2020-03-08
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:14:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22422415
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minkisolostan/pseuds/minkisolostan
Summary: Dongho is Aron and Jonghyun's uber driver, he watches them fall in  love, out of love, and figure out what being in a relationship means. He also finds the answers to his own questions about love.
Relationships: Choi Minki | Ren/Kang Dongho | Baekho, Kim Jonghyun | JR/Aaron Kwak | Aron
Comments: 7
Kudos: 41
Collections: Spring Blessings (Nu'est 8th Anniversary Fic Fest)





	Uber

**Author's Note:**

> Art by: @cgbgbox on twitter

It was two weeks on the job when Dongho first drove Aron, his face showing up in a little bubble above his current address, which Dongho assumed was the man’s apartment. He entered the car with broken Korean, a slurred hello and an awkward glance at the rear-view mirror. Dongho shifted the car into drive and took the path to the coffee shop Aron wanted to be dropped off at. It was night, the streets of Seoul busy with students rushing home late on a Friday, ready for a break from their studies, and twenty somethings stumbling out of bars with ties undone and blazers hanging over their arms, drunk from a night out of schmoozing their higher ups. This is what Dongho loved best about driving, he loves people, loves watching them live their lives, everyone walking a different path. Of course, he didn’t leave his family’s farm to drive for Uber, but it’s the only thing making him money while he attempted to sell his music.

He wanted to ask Aron why he was headed to a coffee shop so late at night. He had nothing but an English novel in his hand, no laptop, no immediate work to be done. Maybe he had a meeting, maybe he needed some alone time, either way, Dongho couldn’t ask, because communicating with Aron seemed impossible. For a moment, Dongho wished he would have taken English instead of Japanese in high school.

At the coffee shop, Aron left with an English goodbye, probably forgetting for a second where he was. Dongho watched him enter the shop and take a seat at the bar that’s attached to the counter. He didn’t order anything right away, but Dongho couldn’t help but notice how empty the shop was. So, no meeting. Then a barista, about their age, approached Aron and the book was pushed to the side and Dongho knew it was time to leave.

\--

The next time Dongho drives Aron, it’s a few months later and his Korean has stepped up immensely. It’s still very formal, but he’s able to hold a conversation.

“Does this place have good coffee?” Dongho asks, startling the silence in the car.

Aron cracks a smile. “No, it is terrible.”

“Then why go back?”

“I go every Friday; I cannot break the habit.”

“There must be something special there.”

Aron glances out the window. “There is.” Dongho wants to ask about the man behind the counter, but he doesn’t want to assume anything.

Dongho drops him off and Aron runs through the door, how to speak Korean book in his hand. The barista’s face lights up and he hands Aron an already premade coffee.

A week later, Aron is dressed in a blazer and an ironed white shirt. His hair has a light touch of gel in it and before he got into his car, Dongho noticed that there’s a second and third stop that isn’t the coffee shop.

He also notices Aron’s fidget. “Big night?”

“You could say that.”

“You look nice.”

“Thank you.”

The second address is two blocks away and another apartment.

“I’ll be right back,” Aron says and Dongho waves him away.

A few moments later he’s walking back to the car with the barista next to him, big smiles on both their faces. Dongho doesn’t ask any more questions he only glances in the rear-view mirror at stop lights. For the most part, they are looking out the window,  
taking turns sneaking a glance at each other and sometimes, Dongho drives a few notches under the speed limit. He drops them off at a somewhat fancy restaurant in the shopping district, he doesn’t pick them up again that night, but he hopes everything went alright.

His hopes are answered a few nights later when he picks them up at three AM. He was just about to turn off the app and head to bed when he got the notification, any other time he would have canceled it but he was far too interested in seeing where these two were going, so he headed out in his sweats and to a club in downtown Seoul.

He smells alcohol as soon as they enter his car. Their hands are clasped together, and the barista is laughing into Aron’s neck.

“Have fun?” Dongho asks, shifting into drive and heading for Aron’s apartment.

“Jonghyun stop,” Aron whispers, pushing the man away from his neck which Dongho can now see a visible bruise on. “Yeah, tons.”

Dongho shakes his head and wonders for the first time in a while what it’s like to be like them. He used to be, when he first moved to Seoul, he had his own boy, Minki, but he lost him to the industry with a promise that he would see him again when Dongho became a producer. It’s been years and he hasn’t seen him since.

The ride is short and the clock ticks over to 3:30 and Dongho is feeling every number on his dashboard. Aron climbs out of the car, pulling Jonghyun with him. He watches the men trip over each other as they head into the apartment complex and Dongho heads home before he falls asleep at the wheel.

\--

Dongho doesn’t drive for three weeks, he finally sold a song. A company named Pledis finally took the time to listen to one of his MP3’s. Apparently they are debuting a new male duo soon and their current producer was on paternity leave.

\--

He’s driving Aron and Jonghyun to the movie theater when his song comes on the radio. He tells them it’s his song, but the tears didn’t start till the chorus when he heard Minki’s voice.

\--

“Hey,” Aron says as he climbs into the passenger seat of Dongho’s car.

“Hey, how are you?”

“Fine, heard anything from your boy yet?”

“Not yet. How are you and Jonghyun?”

Aron cracks a smile. “It’s our three-month anniversary today and he couldn’t get work off, so I’m bringing a romantic dinner to him.”

Aron holds up a plastic bag Dongho didn’t notice when he first got in, the shift making the pasta smell reap from the bag.

“That’s very nice of you.”

Dongho drops him off at the coffee shop and he watches as Jonghyun almost launches himself over the counter in an attempt to hug Aron.

Dongho has never celebrated a three-month anniversary, he’s never celebrated anything other than a year, which makes him wonder why, because love deserves to be celebrated always.

Dongho drives them around for four months and he started to wonder a while ago how they are paying for it, but they go on cheap dates, parks, bowling, ramen restaurants. He watches Aron and Jonghyun as they sit in his car, wondering how the hell they were lucky enough to find each other. Neither of them have much money, Dongho knows this from some of Aron’s rants about not seeing Jonghyun enough because of their work schedules, but they still manage to make every second with each other count, even if they can’t do anything fancy.

Maybe Dongho could learn from them. He and Minki held each other at far too high of standards, both desperate to reach fame, both wanting too hard for the riches that came with it, that they lost sight of each other along the way.

When he gets home, he watches Minki’s debut stage and he types twenty text messages that are never sent.

The next day, he gets a request from Jonghyun. He’s never gotten one from him. When he drives up to Jonghyun’s apartment, the man is standing outside with a cardboard box in his hand. He opens the passenger door and sets it on the seat.

“Can you bring this to Aron?”

“Are you not coming?”

“Not this time.” Jonghyun looks away, but not quick enough to hide the tear trailing down his cheek.

“Okay.”

When Dongho parks in Aron’s apartments parking lot, Aron is already there with a box of his own. They swap and Aron breaks down. Dongho moves the box to the back seat.

“Get in.”

Aron looks at his apartment, probably wondering how fast he could run before Dongho catches up to him. He accepts defeat and climbs in, Dongho reaches into his glove box and hands him some napkins he has sitting in there.

“What happened?”

Aron twists the napkin around his finger. “We broke up.”

“I gathered. But what happened?”

“It’s stupid.”

“If it’s worth a breakup then I doubt it’s that stupid.”

“His parents, they don’t want us together and Jonghyun listened to them. There’s nothing I can do to stop him. He doesn’t love me.”

Dongho puts his car in drive and heads for Jonghyun’s apartment, Aron argues the whole way.

When they get there, Jonghyun is sitting on the front step, his hands tucked into his sweater, wiping at his eyes.

“It looks to me like he’s just as destroyed.”

Aron doesn’t move.

“Take it from me, it isn’t worth losing him over this.”

Aron finally gets out of the car. Dongho watches as he slowly walks over to Jonghyun and sits on the step next to him then Jonghyun is hugging him, crying into his chest.

When Dongho gets home, he cancels the ride, returning the large sum of cash back to Jonghyun.

For their one-year anniversary, Dongho buys them dinner at one of the best restaurants in Seoul, then he drives them, free of charge. It’s the least he can do since they’ve paid for a few months’ rent. They try to argue but Dongho just shakes his head. He hasn’t told them yet, but he’s accepted a job at Pedis to work as a producer, and soon he won’t be driving them at all.

The next day, when he’s driving them home from the hotel Aron booked for them, he tells them, and they are ecstatic. Aron almost causes him to run a red light with how loud he yells.

The exchange phone numbers and promise to keep in touch.

A month later he’s working at Pledis with their new rookie group Seventeen, it’s hard to produce for thirteen people on top of teaching their producer how to work the equipment but he manages. He hasn’t seen Minki yet, he’s been on a world tour and working on a film and Dongho couldn’t be prouder. He wonders if Minki is thinking about him.  
In the middle of a very frustrating sequins of mistakes the young men are putting him through, he gets a text from Aron, asking for a favor. Later that night, he’s driving Aron and a bunch of boxes to Jonghyun’s apartment.

“So, finally moving in?”

“We’ve been staying over at each other’s house every night, so we figured why not save money on rent.”

“Well, I think it’s a great idea.”

He helps Aron move his boxes upstairs. Jonghyun greets them at the door and is all smiles when he see’s Dongho. He orders them food as they finish moving all the boxes and Dongho joins them at the small table made for one.

At work on Monday, Minki is in the studio, waiting for him.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” He asks and Dongho doesn’t know how to answer, so he doesn’t.

Dongho takes Aron to the pound. Somehow, he convinced Jonghyun to let him adopt a dog but Jonghyun couldn’t help him pick one out since he had to work, so he asked Dongho to accompany Aron.

“Make sure he doesn’t come back with an absolute terror,” Jonghyun said.

One walk through and Aron has zeroed in on a Shiba Inu puppy and he named him Noah before they arrived back to the apartment.

His first night with Minki in his bed since they left each other years ago, Aron calls him, frantic. There was a bus accident downtown and Jonghyun was one of the people injured, he was being flown to the nearest hospital on a helicopter.

Dongho didn’t think, he threw on his shirt and ran out to the car, Minki yelling behind him.

“Where is he?” Dongho asks as soon Aron opens his passenger door.

“The hospital by the airport.”

“That’s so far away.”

Dongho tries not to speed too much as he makes his way down the familiar roads of Seoul.

“It was the only hospital ready for surgery.”

“What happened?”

“They wouldn’t tell me.”

“Why?”

“I’m not family.”

Dongho wants to yell, scream even but he knows that won’t help Aron, instead he steps on his gas a little more.

“I’m sorry for calling you,” Aron says and Dongho shakes his head.

“Never apologize for this kind of thing. And I was doing something stupid anyways.”

“Were you with him?”

“Yeah.”

The night before his first day at Pledis, Dongho and Aron drank too much and Dongho’s past relationship with Minki came spilling out. Aron told him that they should start again, now that they are older, in better head spaces, in better points of their lives but  
Dongho said otherwise. Except tonight, when Minki came over with a bottle of wine and an apology on his lips and Dongho could never tell him no.

He’s glad Aron called, before they made a mistake. They need to talk first.

When they get to the hospital, there’s ten ambulance’s crowding the entrance, waiting for their turn to drop off their patients at the bay, so Aron and Dongho try to stay out of the way, but find their way through the doors. When they enter, Jonghyun’s family is hugging him, petting his hair and telling him the news.

Three broken ribs, a broken collarbone and a fractured wrist.

It could have been worse; a teenage girl had died from the impact but because of Jonghyun’s choice of seating he was safe. It’s weird how fate can depend on a bus seat.

When Dongho gets home, Minki is asleep on his couch, a cold cup of tea in his hand.

In the morning, he gets a text from Aron, Jonghyun will be home in two weeks.

A few weeks later, Dongho makes some premade dinners and brings them over to Aron and Jonghyun’s. This is the last time he see’s them for a few months, wanting to leave them to heal, and he had some healing himself to do too.

Halfway through the year, when the sun is bright in the sky and the summer heat makes it unbearable to be outside for more than ten minutes, Dongho gets a call from Aron.

“I’m going to propose, and I need a favor.”

So, on their two-year anniversary, Dongho drives Aron and Jonghyun to the park, where they walked around after their first date. He helps Jonghyun out of the car, still a little sore, but otherwise fine, while Aron collects the picnic basket from the trunk.

“What’s all this?” Jonghyun asks. Dongho hugs him and wishes the couple luck.

That night, he gets a text from Aron: will you be my best man?

Dongho has spent the past two years watching Aron and Jonghyun fall in love, and he never thought he’d get the second chance himself. But this morning he woke up and Minki was fast asleep on his chest, his shoulder length brown hair in a tangled mess sprawled around his head, some in Dongho’s mouth, and when Minki wakes up he whispers words of love against his lips.

On the big day, Minki sat in his passenger seat, his hair now black, shaved sides and a stunning suit Dongho can’t fathom the cost of and Aron and Jonghyun sit in the back seat, lost in each other, in equally of stunning suits but these white. Dongho pulls up to the venue and opens the door for them.

“I can’t believe they are breaking tradition and choosing to see each other before the walk.”

“It’s their wedding Minki, you can be traditional at your own wedding.”  
Dongho pretends not to hear Minki whisper “ours”.

Dongho drives them to the airport, now clad in shorts and t shirts, ready for their long flight to Paris.

“Are you sure you’re okay dog sitting Noah?” Aron asks, for the tenth time since he got in the car.

“Yes Aron, he likes me best anyways.”

“No need to rub it in.”

Dongho helps them unload their suitcases then the two men are hugging him, swallowing them in their warmth.

“Thank you,” Jonghyun says.

“For what?”

“Everything. Without you, who knows where we would be.”

“There’s other Ubers.”

“You’re more than an Uber driver,” Aron says, shaking his head.

He watches them enter the airport, hand in hand, faces still a little swollen from the wedding but happy.

Dongho returns home to find Minki and Noah cuddled up on the couch with Chinese and he couldn’t have imagined that his life would have turned out this way.

**Author's Note:**

> My twitter is @minkisolostan


End file.
